Before National Poetry Month closes for another year, I want to say thank you to Terrain.org A Journal of the Natural and Built Environment for inviting me to submit a poem for their "Letter to America" series. Their website describes the initiative this way:
Letter to America series presents urgent, powerful, and beautiful post-election responses from writers, artists, scientists, and thinkers across the United States. We have published letters in the form of poems, photographs, traditional letters, and more — each an intimate, thoughtful examination and discourse at a time when the breakdown of civility and democracy seem to have gained the upper hand.
And while yes, this was written after the results of the presidential election were made known, I think of this piece as more a note to the self; a reminder of the necessity of personal survival in dire times. Here is the beginning of the poem and a link to continue reading; they are also looking for more "letters" for the series.
Mornings
When a mourning dove flies up from the land, the sky
Only seems to embrace her. The erasure of color, of movement
From the field, the shrug of wings—
My eyes keep watch long after the bird
Flies off between wave clouds. The panorama
Pleases because it is not me. Does not possess
Worries or regrets, does not listen to the news,
Only negotiates with shining scraps of paper,
The pine cones along the side road. I’m still staring
After the stormscape—seeing emptiness as incessant
As the mountains suffocated in fog—
Ghost lives that alter over the time
It takes to button a coat, adjust a shirtsleeve.
We’re invisible to ourselves though we look
(to continue reading, click here)
Comments
Post a Comment